Wednesday, October 25, 2017

October 25, 1957 – The Chicago Sun-Times begins moving from 211 West Wacker Drive into its
new headquarters building on the north branch of the Chicago River between
Wabash Avenue and Rush Street.Completion of the move is expected by the end of November. As part of
the groundbreaking ceremonies in November of 1955, 600 dignitaries, including
Mayor Richard J. Daley, Governor William Stratton, and Senator Everett Dirksen,
came together in the Palmer House to celebrate what was considered to be the
keystone of the Fort Dearborn Project, a plan to redevelop the city north of
the river and west of Michigan Avenue.The
building was the first building in the city to use “curtain wall” technology,
in which the building’s steel frame provides structural integrity, and the
window glass and mullions act as a curtain covering that frame. The structure
was designed by the architectural firm of Naess and Murphy, the same firm that
designed the Prudential building, finished two years before the Sun Times building opened.Critical opinions of the building
differed.Said Professor Robert
Bruegmann of the University of Illinois at Chicago, “If it got as far as 2007,
there would be a very considerable interest in putting it on the National
Register of Historic Places.A lot of
these buildings are killed off at just the moment before they come back into
their own.” [Chicago Magazine, January 5,
2004] The building was levelled to make way for Trump Tower which opened in
2008.

October 25, 1974 – Riding a 40-horse wagon, following a parade of elephants, clowns and circus wagons, sculptor Alexander Calder rides into the Loop to dedicate two sculptures. As Calder’s wagon stops at the Dirksen Federal Building Plaza at Dearborn and Adams, architect Carter Manny, Jr. blows a whistle and announces, “Ladies and gentlemen and children of all ages, I present to the people the one and only Alexander the Great – Sandy Calder.” [Chicago Tribune, October 26, 1974] The sculptor and Mayor Richard J. Daley share a gigantic pair of scissors to cut the rope surrounding the 53-foot-high Flamingo. In his remarks His Honor calls the Loop, “one of the world’s largest outdoor museums for contemporary sculpture” before naming Calder an honorary Chicago citizen. Arthur Sampson, head of the General Services Administration that commissioned the $350,000 sculpture, reads a letter from President Gerald Ford that calls the Federal Center sculpture “a conspicuous milestone in the federal government’s effort to create a better environment.” The entourage continues on to Sears Tower where Calder sets in motion his 32-foot-high kinetic wall mural and delivers his only speech of the day, saying, “Mr. Arthur Wood [the board chairman of Sears, Roebuck and Company] wanted me to give it a name. So I thought of a name. I call it, ‘Mr. Wood’s Universe.’”